CHAPTER 11:

DESIGNING AND IMPLEMENTING

BRANDING STRATEGIES

Kevin Lane Keller

Tuck School of Business
Dartmouth College

11.1
 Branding strategy
 Branding strategy is critical because it is the
means by which the firm can help consumers
understand its products and services and
organize them in their minds.
 Two important strategic tools: The brand-product
matrix and the brand hierarchy help to characterize
and formulate branding strategies by defining
various relationships among brands and
products.

11.2
 Branding Strategy or Brand
Architecture
 The branding strategy for a firm reflects the
number and nature of common or distinctive
brand elements applied to the different products
sold by the firm.
 Which brand elements can be applied to which
products and the nature of new and existing brand
elements to be applied to new products

11.3
 The role of Brand Architecture
 Clarify: brand awareness
 Improve consumer understanding and communicate
similarity and differences between individual
products
 Motivate: brand image
 Maximize transfer of equity to/from the brand to
individual products to improve trial and repeat
purchase

11.4
 Brand-Product Matrix
Products
1 2 3 4
A
Brands B
C

 Must define:
 Brand-Product relationships (rows)
 Line and category extensions
 Product-Brand relationships (columns)
 Brand portfolio

11.5
 Important Definitions
 Product line
 A group pf products within a product category that
are closely related
 Product mix (product assortment)
 The set of all product lines and items that a
particular seller makes available to buyers
 Brand mix (brand assortment)
 The set of all brand lines that a particular seller
makes available to buyers

11.6
 Breadth of a Branding Strategy
 Breadth of product mix
 Aggregate market factors
 Category factors
 Environmental factors

 Depth of product mix

 Examining the percentage of sales and profits
contributed by each item in the product line
 Deciding to increase the length of the product line
by adding new variants or items typically expands
market coverage and therefore market share but also
increases costs
11.7
 Depth of a Branding Strategy
 The number and nature of different brands
marketed in the product class sold by a firm
 Referred to as brand portfolio
 The reason is to pursue different market
segments, different channels of distribution, or
different geographic boundaries
 Maximize market coverage and minimize brand
overlap

11.8
Ford Brand Portfolio

11.9
 Designing a Brand Portfolio
 Basic principles:
 Maximize market coverage so that no potential
customers are being ignored
 Minimize brand overlap so that brands aren’t
competing among themselves to gain the same
customer’s approval

11.10
 Brand Roles in the Portfolio
 Flankers
 Cash cows
 Low-end entry-level
 High-end prestige brands

11.11
 Brand Hierarchy
 A means of summarizing the branding strategy
by displaying the number and nature of
common and distinctive brand elements across
the firm’s products, revealing the explicit
ordering of brand elements
 A useful means of graphically portraying a
firm’s branding strategy

11.12
 Brand Hierarchy Tree: Toyota
Toyota
Corporation

Toyota Toyota Toyota Toyota Lexus

(Trucks) (SUV/vans) (Cars) Financial
Services

Corolla MR2
Camry Avalon Celica ECHO Matrix Prius
Spyder
Platinum
CE SE Edition
S LE XL SE
LE XLE XLS SLE

11.13
Brand Hierarchy Levels

Corporate Brand (General Motors)

Family Brand (Buick)

Individual Brand (Park Avenue)

Modifier: Item or Model (Ultra)

11.14
 Corporate Brand Equity
 Occurs when relevant constituents hold strong,
favorable, and unique associations about the
corporate brand in memory
 Encompasses a much wider range of
associations than a product brand

11.15
 Family Brands
 Brands applied across a range of product
categories
 An efficient means to link common associations
to multiple but distinct products

11.16
 Individual Brands
 Restricted to essentially one product category
 There may be multiple product types offered on
the basis of different models, package sizes,
flavors, etc.

11.17
 Modifiers
 Signals refinements or differences in the brand
related to factors such as quality levels,
attributes, functions, etc.
 Plays an important organizing role in
communicating how different products within a
category that share the same brand name are

11.18
 Corporate Image Dimensions
 Corporate product attributes, benefits or attitudes
 Quality
 Innovativeness
 People and relationships
 Customer orientation
 Values and programs
 Concern with the environment
 Social responsibility
 Corporate credibility
 Expertise
 Trustworthiness
 Likability
11.19
 Brand Hierarchy Decisions
 The number of levels of the hierarchy to use
in general
 How brand elements from different levels of
the hierarchy are combined, if at all, for any
one particular product
 How any one brand element is linked, if at all,
to multiple products
 Desired brand awareness and image at each
level
11.20
 Number of Hierarchy Levels
 Principle of simplicity
 Employ as few levels as possible
 Principle of clarity
 Logic and relationship of all brand elements
employed must be obvious and transparent

11.21
 Levels of Awareness and Associations
 Principle of relevance
 Create global associations that are relevant across as
many individual items as possible
 Principle of differentiation
 Differentiate individual items and brands

11.22
 Linking Brands at Different Levels
 Principle of prominence
 The relative prominence of brand elements affects
perceptions of product distance and the type of
image created for new products

11.23
 Linking Brands Across Products
 Principle of commonality
 The more common elements shared by products,
the stronger the linkages

11.24
 Brand Architecture Guidelines
 Adopt a strong customer focus
 Avoid over-branding
 Establish rules and conventions and be
disciplined
 Create broad, robust brand platforms
 Selectively employ sub-brands as means of
complementing and strengthening brands
 Selectively extend brands to establish new
brand equity and enhance existing brand equity
11.25
 Corporate Brand Campaign
 Different objectives are possible:
 Build awareness of the company and the nature of its
business
 Create favorable attitudes and perceptions of company
credibility
 Link beliefs that can be leveraged by product-specific
marketing
 Make a favorable impression on the financial community
 Motivate present employees and attract better recruits
 Influence public opinion on issues

11.26
 Using Cause Marketing to Build
Brand Equity
 The process of formulating and implementing
marketing activities that are characterized by an
offer from the firm to contribute a specified
amount to a designated cause when customers
engage in revenue-providing exchanges that
satisfy organizational and individual objectives

11.27
 Advantages of Cause Marketing
 Building brand awareness
 Enhancing brand image
 Establishing brand credibility
 Evoking brand feelings
 Creating a sense of brand community
 Eliciting brand engagement

11.28
 Green Marketing
 A special case of cause marketing that is
particularly concerned with the environment
 Explosion of environmentally friendly products
and marketing programs

11.29
 Crisis Marketing Guidelines
 The two keys to effectively managing a crisis are
that the firm’s response should be swift and that
it should be sincere.

11.30